Max Beckmann

My thoughtsWhen I first came across Beckmann’s work I knew nothing about him. All I knew was that he had some of the most intense drawings I had ever seen. The way he projects the image of himself, others and the world around him shows that he is a man that has seen tragedy of some sort. His drawing show a feeling of claustrophobia, pain and pent up rage causing me to think of what he may have been going through when he worked on his drawings. What I see in Beckmann’s work is a mystery which is why I liked him so much.

Max Beckmann was a very talented artist from Germany. In 1900 he was accepted into Weimar Saxon-Grand Ducal Art School which is one of the most progressive art schools in Germany. From there Beckmann became a strong advocate of German Impressionism.

Beckmann was a volunteer paramedic in World War I. the things he saw in the war caused him to have a mental brake down and be suspended from the military. After the war he changed his style to expressionism.

In this drawing you can see Beckmann’s changes. You can see something

smoking in the distance attracting the attention of the people who are

probably feeling some sort of worriedness or excitement.

Working from those drawings, he created work

that was more dynamic and more infused with emotion.

His academically correct style gave way to distortions of

figure and space. This stylistic change reflected Beckmann's altered vision of himself and humanity. But in the 1920’s Beckmann had an artistic

break through.

In 1925 he began teaching a master class at the Frankfurt Städelschul. In 1927 he received the Honorary Empire Prize for German Art and the Gold Medal of the

City of Düsseldorf. Over the course of his life Beckmann produced an extraordinary number of self-portraits. His production is rivaled only by Rembrandt and Picasso. Throughout his life Beckmann struggled to define himself through his

painting. His self-portraits are infused with symbolism.

When the Nazis’ rose up in Germany, Beckmann was classified by Hitler himself a degenerate. Beckmann had been relieved of his professorship at Frankfurt's Städelschule. His work was no longer allowed to be displayed

anywhere except in Exhibitions of Shame

For ten years Beckmann lived in poverty in self-imposed exile in

Amsterdam. He failed in his desperate attempts to obtain a visa for the United States. Then

again in 1944 the Germans attempted to draft him into the army, despite the fact that the

sixty-year-old artist had suffered a heart attack

. After the war Beckmann moved to the United States and during the last three years of his life he taught at the art schools of Washington University in St. Louis with the German-

American painter and printmaker Werner Drewes. He suffered from angina pectoris and died after Christmas 1950, struck down by a heart attack in Manhattan.

When some people think of Max Beckmann they think of

claustrophobia a small place, filled with people. You can't breathe, you can't escape, and you are stuck in this small room with so many big-

boned people. You will rot with them as they are rotting before your very eyes. So close you can

almost see the disturbed thoughts of your nearest and dearest

because in every corner the foul breath of a family relative is in your

face. There's no escape and the walls are slowly but inexorably

closing in until the room will fit you and your big-boned family like a

coffin